Jimmy Hopkins
James "Jimmy" Hopkins is the playable protagonist and main character in Bully. He was voiced by Gerry Rosenthal. Character Description Jimmy is 15 years old and is smaller in height than most students, but is reasonably stocky. He has freckles on his cheeks, and wears a gold stud earring on his left ear. He also has a ginger buzz cut. At the beginning of the game, he wears a brown jacket over a white t-shirt, with faded blue jeans and white sneakers. His school uniform consists of a blue Bullworth vest over a white shirt with khaki school slacks. Over the course of the game, Jimmy can obtain a wide variety of clothes, haircuts, and tattoos. This allows the player to either have him adopt the look of one of the cliques, or make his own unique fashion statement. He generally wears his clothing more disordered than intended; for example, he wears his school uniform with the collar unbuttoned and unfolded, and his white shirt is untucked. In early screenshots, Jimmy was somewhat uglier. He had fewer freckles, a larger and red nose, and ears that stuck out. He also wore gray slacks and boots instead of khaki slacks and sneakers. Character Inspiration Jimmy was designed to be an everykid. Lead Producer of Bully, Jeronimo Barerra, claimed that what he wanted to do with Bully was to recreate the state of being a kid, and to make it fun. Parallels were also made between Jimmy and Holden Caulfield, the main character of The Catcher in the Rye. Jimmy and Holden share a background of having a difficult home life and being thrown out of multiple private schools. Jimmy even uses Holden's favorite derogatory term, "phony", to describe his new stepfather.Jimmy:Mom, why did you marry that phony? When Bully was first announced and the first four screenshots were released, it appeared that Jimmy Hopkins (then unnamed) would be a player controlled antagonist, taking the role of the titular bully. By the next update on the game, which was a few years later, Jimmy had been re-imaged as a protagonist who stood up to the bullies. Character History Jimmy is 15 years old. He is dumped at Bullworth Academy by his often remarried mother and his new stepfather, who Jimmy describes as a "rich old phony", whilst they go on a year long honeymoon cruise. Jimmy had previously been expelled from seven schools for a variety of reasons which include graffiti, violent conduct, bad language, disrespecting staff, and according to small talk, arson. Bullworth is Jimmy's last chance to avoid juvenile detention and, knowing Bullworth's reputation, he prepares for the worst. Characteristics .]] Jimmy is slightly undersized, however, his tough childhood has granted him both a level of physical toughness, fighting skill (enabling him to hold his own against students larger and stronger than him), and a level of awareness and maturity that most of his peers at Bullworth don't have. Though he's aggressive and quick to fight, he's not truly malicious. As he states early on in the game, "I only give people what they have coming to them." When dealing with others, Jimmy tends to be rough mannered. He talks abusively to people (such as Algie) even when helping them. His only real friend at the school is Pete Kowalski, but Jimmy doesn't treat him with respect either, calling him a dork to his face. Despite this, he seems to have a decent underlying nature, frequently moved to defend people who are weaker than he is. He helps the Nerds despite his rude treatment of them, and later in the game, he helps Mandy despite the fact that she was antagonistic to him through most of the school year. He also gets along with any teachers who are willing to treat him with respect, which perhaps surprisingly, is all of them besides Mr. Hattrick. To a large extent, Jimmy's personality within the game depends on the players control of him. While his actions in the cutscenes are predetermined, Jimmy can deal with situations in different ways. For example, he can order other bullies to leave their victims alone, or he can bully the other kids himself. He can also pay off bullies to leave him alone, or start fights for no reason. During the course of the in-game missions he causes all the girls in the cliques (Beatrice, Pinky, Lola, Mandy, and Zoe) to have a relationship with him, even though the only girls he goes on actual dates with are Pinky and Zoe. He can also kiss one boy in each clique (Trent, Cornelius, Gord, Vance, Kirby and Duncan), but this doesn't come into play in the actual storyline, and the player can chose whether to have him do this or not. The only character Jimmy shows long term interest in, however, is Zoe. The end of the final mission closes with Zoe kissing Jimmy on the steps leading to the Academy. Role in game As the protagonist, the player controls Jimmy throughout the game and all of the storyline revolves around him. Trivia *Jimmy reportedly made a cameo appearance as a pedestrian and a party-goer in Grand Theft Auto IV. The person in question however, is merely a black NPC-pedestrian who wears a blue vest over a white shirt, tan slacks and white sneakers. References Hopkins, Jimmy Hopkins, Jimmy